Health and social care regulation to merge
Plans to merge the Healthcare Commission and the Commission for Social
Care Inspection have been put out for public consultation (PDF 1MB) by
the Department of Health. The new inspectorate will also take over the
role
of the Mental
Health Act Commission.
The new commission will be responsible for ensuring the safety and quality
of all publicly and privately funded health care and adult social care
and for assessing performance. It will share responsibility for promoting
choice and competition with the Office of Fair Trading and will help
strategic health authorities monitor primary care trusts.
Sir Ian Kennedy, chairman of the Healthcare Commission, said that the
proposals will ensure that regulation works in tandem with other changes
in health and social care to promote better outcomes.
The new care regulator will be expected to register all public and private
providers of health and adult social care and to measure them against
a single set of national standards.
Sir Ian said that this will give patients a single assurance on safety
and quality regardless of where they go for treatment. He added: “Where
there are serious doubts about the safety of patients, the move would
give the regulator powers to withdraw a provider’s right to provide
NHS services.”
The consultation closes on 28 February 2007.
Stronger regulation A better
regulatory system is needed for the emerging NHS
market, according to the King’s Fund. On the day that consultation started
on plans to merge health and social care regulation, a King’s Fund report
called for stronger regulation to monitor and enforce the right competitive relationship
between health care providers and to ensure an effective way of dealing with
hospital failures. King’s Fund chief executive Niall Dickson added: “We
need to balance the danger of over-regulation, which will stifle innovation,
and an unbridled market, which could deliver chaos and inequity.” |
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The
Pharmaceutical Journal
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